Shocker at Shade

February 20, 2008|By CRISTY MECK, Shade

Early last Thursday, my high school was subject to a very juvenile prank.

On Jan. 31, a bomb threat was discovered written, grammatically incorrect, in a girl’s bathroom stall. This threat read “I . . . is going to blow up the school!” with the name of a student also included in the message.

I’m sure you would agree that these “choice” words were written as an immature joke and posed no real threat. However as our administrators advised, “ Anything is possible, and a situation such as this should always be handled with extreme precaution.” For that reason, our school was evacuated and we began a standard bomb threat procedure.

Many students I spoke with on this issue agreed that the administration handled things very well. We were safely evacuated from the school, transported to a safe location, and our parents were given at least a two hours notice from the time we would be dismissed. Another attribute that helped keep students at ease was that our administrators filled us in on every aspect of the situation, leaving nothing out. Things are a lot brighter when you’re not left in the dark.

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No matter how well the administration pulled things off, students were still scorned and in disbelief that someone would stoop so low to make a false threat against the school. Because of this person’s lack of intelligence many students’ day, and schedules were ruined.

“I studied very hard for a test I was supposed to have that day,” said Scott Sandusky, “ then due to the snow day on Friday, plus the long weekend I forgot practically everything I had studied so hard for”

Another senior, Wayne Deneen was also upset over this matter.

“I’d been waiting all week for the first ski trip, and was looking forward to snow boarding that day, but someone had to go and ruin it for everyone!”

Not only did this so-called “threat” leave many students displeased, but school administrators as well. The school lost thousands of irreplaceable dollars in downtime, not to mention expenses for police and other officials summoned to the scene.

Finally at around 1:34 p.m. police cleared the school, concluding that the threat was illegitimate.

This act was not only immature, but an embarrassment to the entire Shade Central City School District, and whoever is at fault has hopefully realized that.